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Expanded – NASAL OXYGEN and CANCER

Expanding on the below article from March 5th, Dartmouth researchers say they can measure oxygen levels in cancer cells and help target treatment at times when oxygen levels make cancer cells most susceptible to treatment.

A novel technique will help clinicians directly measure oxygen and schedule treatments at times of high oxygen levels in cancer and stroke patients to improve outcomes, says investigators at Dartmouth’s Geisel School of Medicine.

Led by Harold Swartz, MD, PhD, the team published their groundbreaking progress on the decades-old conundrum of how to measure oxygenation in deep-sited tissue in a paper titled, “Deep-Tissue Oxygen Monitoring in the Brain of Rabbits for Stroke Research,” published in Stroke.

“This is a major step forward,” said first author Nadeem Khan, PhD, “It brings our Electron Paramagnetic Resonance (EPR) oximetry technique to the forefront of biomedical research for clinical applications.”

Oxygen is necessary to sustain life. A certain level of oxygen in a cell or tissue is necessary to maintain normal processes, such as the generation of energy by cells. Oxygen also plays a pivotal role in the development and treatment of various diseases. The effectiveness of several therapies also depends on the oxygen levels in a malignancy.

For example, a very low level of oxygen in cancer (solid tumors) is known to develop aggressive phenotypes, varies with the growth of tumors, and also compromises the effectiveness of chemotherapy and radiation. Therefore, it is very important to directly measure oxygen levels to understand disease progression, develop strategies to improve oxygen levels, and optimize the efficacy of therapies. –END–

In the above research on a device that measures the oxygenation of deep tissue cells, doctors acknowledge that getting more oxygen into cells will make cancer treatments work better and knowing how much oxygen is in a cell can lead to ground breaking changes in the treatment of cancer, stroke, and various disease.

But do you need cutting edge technology to make oxygen work for you?

One way many cancers grow resistant to treatment is by generating a web of blood vessels that are so jumbled they fail to provide adequate oxygen to the tumor. With oxygen starvation, the tumor gains a sort of cloaking device that protects it from the toxic effects of chemotherapy drugs and radiation, which are designed to seek out well-oxygenated tissue.

Researchers have long tested various approaches to improving blood flow to the tumor in the hopes of restoring potency to treatments. Not much has shown promise.

Until researchers investigated exercise.

In a study published in the March 16, 2015, issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, researchers led by Duke Cancer Institute (DCI) scientists studied the impact of exercise in models of breast cancer in mice. They found that exercise stimulated significant improvements in the number and function of blood vessels around the tumors, improving oxygen flow to the cancer site. When treated with chemotherapy, the tumors shrank markedly better than they did in sedentary animals.

Among the animals that exercised, tumor growth was significantly slower than growth in the sedentary mice, and tumor cell death was 1.5 times higher. The density of small blood vessels was approximately 60 percent higher in exercised mice compared to the controls, and oxygen transport improved, leading to less oxygen starvation of the cancer tissue. The vasculature in the tumors also looked and behaved more normally.

North­eastern Uni­ver­sity researchers have found that inhaling sup­ple­mental oxygen—40 to 60 per­cent oxygen as opposed to the 21 per­cent oxygen in air—can weaken immuno­sup­pres­sion and awaken anti-​​tumor cells. The new approach, some 30 years in the making, could dra­mat­i­cally increase the sur­vival rate of patients with cancer, which kills some 8 mil­lion people each year. The break­through find­ings were pub­lished Wednesday in Sci­ence Trans­la­tional Med­i­cine.

Michail Sitkovsky, an immuno­phys­i­ology researcher at North­eastern Uni­ver­sity, and his team found that sup­ple­mental oxy­gena­tion inhibits the hypoxia-​​​​driven accu­mu­la­tion of adeno­sine in the tumor microen­vi­ron­ment and weakens immuno­sup­pres­sion. This, in turn, could improve cancer immunotherapy and shrink tumors by unleashing anti-​​​​tumor T lym­pho­cytes and nat­ural killer cells.

“Breathing sup­ple­mental oxygen opens up the gates of the tumor fortress and wakes up ‘sleepy’ anti-​​​​tumor cells, enabling these sol­diers to enter the fortress and destroy it,” explained Sitkovsky, the Eleanor W. Black Chair and Pro­fessor of Immuno­phys­i­ology and Phar­ma­ceu­tical Biotech­nology at North­eastern and the founding director of the university’s New Eng­land Inflam­ma­tion and Tissue Pro­tec­tion Insti­tute.

Genes Respond to Restoration of Oxygen SignalingMajid Ali, M.D.

A cancer cell is a fermentative cell – that is a cell whose metabolic process converts sugar to acids, gases, and/or alcohol – that is oxygen suffocating materials.

This is the core of my Oxygen Model of Cancer. However this central metabolic characteristic feature of cancer cell is not irreversible, as is commonly believed. Control of cellular fermentation is the central goal of my Oxygen Protocol for Cancer for treating cancer.

I have illustrated the clinical significance of these models in a series of articles and my two books entitled “Oxygen Model of Cancer” and “Oxygen Protocol for Cancer.” In previous publications, I presented case histories of patients whose control of cancer over long periods without surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy challenges the validity of the Warburg Effect.

The matter of the Warbug Effect (see below) is crucial in all deliberations of oxygen issues in the treatment of cancer. Doctors who do not study molecular biology of oxygen and oxygen signaling continue to make silly statements about the central roles of oxygen in the cause and treatment of cancer. Before addressing this subject, below are brief outlines of my models of cancer.

My Oxygen Model of Cancer

My Oxygen Model of Cancer is an extension of my Oxygen Model of Health and Disease. It is a unifying model that explains all aspects of malignant tumors—causes, clinical course, consequences, and control—on the basis of disturbed oxygen function. The most important among these are:
(1) impaired or blocked oxygen signaling;
(2) interrupted oxygen’s ATP energy generation;
(3) diminished oxygen’s detergent functions;
(4) interrupted oxygen’s cellular detox functions;
(5) impeded oxygen-governed cellular repair mechanisms; and
(6) oxygen-regulated cell membrane and matrix functions. These abnormalities usually begin in early life but may develop at any time during life.

The Oxygen Protocol for Cancer

In controlling and eradicating cancer, the Oxygen Model requires that all relevant “oxygen issues” in a case—whether or not related to the recognizable aspects of cancerous tumors—must be effectively addressed. In my experience, the clinical results for individuals with cancer are far superior when all relevant nutritional, environmental, and stress-related threats to oxygen signaling are effectively addressed. Specifically, these issues include fermentation, increased gut permeability (leaky gut state), and glucose-insulin-roller coasters.

The Warbug Effect

In 1923, the German biochemist Otto Warburg published evidence for a respiratory-to-fermentative shift in energy generation (glycolysis) in cancer cells. Specifically, he documented the presence of pyruvate-to-lactate conversion, which is the biochemical hallmark of metabolism under conditions of lack of oxygen. Warburg claimed that glycolysis predominates in tumor cells even when oxygen is plentiful. This is referred to as the ‘Warburg effect’ or aerobic glycolysis. To my knowledge, Warburg never mentioned oxygen signaling in his writings, even in later years after he had received two unshared Nobel Prizes. That is understandable since the many influences of oxygen on proteins, such as hypoxia-inducible factors, had not been discovered during his lifetime.

Dysoxygenosis and Deranged Oxygen Signaling

In 1998, I introduced the term dysoxygenosis for impaired oxygen functions, which includes abnormal oxygen signaling. I devote large sections of my two-volume book on cancer to these subjects. The core aspects of these dysfunctions are included above.

The Warburg Effect Is Reversible

In previous publications, I have asserted that the Warburg Effect is not irreversible, as Warburg originally claimed. Regrettably, the irreversibility of the Effect still is believed widely, in spite of mounting evidence against it, by those who think ethe behavior of genes controlling cancer metabolism cannot be altered.

The Oxygen Protocol for the Treatment of Cancer

In controlling and eradicating cancer, the Oxygen Model requires that all relevant “oxygen issues” in a case—whether or not related to the recognizable aspects of cancerous tumors—must be effectively addressed. In my experience, the clinical results for individuals with cancer are far superior when all relevant nutritional, environmental, and stress-related threats to oxygen signaling are effectively addressed. Specifically, these issues include fermentation, increased gut permeability (leaky gut state), and glucose-insulin-roller coasters.

Volume 1 of Dr. Ali’s two volume cancer book series.

The Dysox Model of Cancer

A cancer cell is a fermentative cell. This is the core of my Oxygen Model of Cancer. However this central metabolic characteristic feature of cancer cell is not irreversible, as is commonly believed. Control of cellular fermentation is the central goal of my Oxygen Protocol for Cancer for treating cancer.

I have illustrated the clinical significance of these models in a series of articles and my two books entitled “Oxygen Model of Cancer” and “Oxygen Protocol for Cancer.” In previous publications, I presented case histories of patients whose control of cancer over long periods without surgery, radiotherapy, and chemotherapy.